


Dewey 623.1

by marcelo



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 10:31:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17558723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marcelo/pseuds/marcelo
Summary: Technically speaking, Barbara doesn't read everything. Oracle does.





	Dewey 623.1

Oracle's systems monitor any number of communication channels. Intercepted messages matching statistically defined patterns are automatically decrypted, classified, and acted upon by an expert system of near-AI complexity. Very few of them are actually flagged for Barbara's personal attention.

There are seventy-five issues currently in her main workflow monitor. The one at the top is a message discovered on a routine sweep of FSB covert transmissions. It's not strange that the message's language isn't Russian; the Sluzhba Bezopasnosti is as pragmatically capitalist as any other branch of Putin's government, and will rent its encrypted channels to anybody who can pay for them. But not many messages are redacted in medieval Chinese.

That was the first factor that made the system tag it. There were soon others, as the automated heuristics cross-referenced its databases and hacked other communication systems, filling up details about the message as the minutes went by.

It's a murder contract, date unclear from the message's contents.

The system keeps accumulating contextual information, clarifying the message. As there are no operator inputs despite the high priority of the flagged message, priority routines take over. Operative status records are queried -location, skills, current level of access in Oracle's network- and matched against estimated mission profiles. An operative is selected, and an encrypted message with all the relevant information is routed to his systems.

The PDA in Nightwing's gauntlet acknowledges receipt half a second later.

Sitting in front of her monitor bank, Barbara's corpse is still cooling.


End file.
